Over the past few years, a hot topic of conversation in the live music industry has been concert etiquette, particularly the rising trend of camping, sometimes even several days for concerts. Camping for concerts has always been a thing that people do for shows however it has grown to be very controversial in recent years.

Tamlyn said: “I think it can ruin the experience for multiple people in the sense that, if you’re camping in order to get in the queue early, people with mobility issues can’t get as close to barrier as they need to incase they need to lean on it. For people who can’t see over tall crowds as well are at a bit of a disadvantage when trying to see and I think it’s unfair for people to do that.”

Jack provided a slightly different perspective explaining: “It’s quite interesting because it’s not new and it’s become such a thing in the past few years because it’s always happened. People camped out for tickets 50 years ago, it’s not a new thing. But the people that do it now, there’s a lack of education around how to behave. It’s the same people that go to gigs and they pass out within two songs because they haven’t drank or they haven’t eaten, and they just don’t really know how to behave because they haven’t gone to that many concerts or they started going to gigs after Covid and I feel like there’s a major difference there. When I think of camping out I think of camping out overnight, I don’t really know what I would think of camping out for a week that’s really weird, but doing it for a night or whatever, I don’t think that’s that bad, But it’s the people that do it, aren’t behaving right to do it.”

Jess is firmly against camping at concerts. She said: “Camping outside for concerts is too far. It’s not normal in the first place because at the end of the day the person that’s performing is human too. It’s an obstruction to people who are trying to live their lives around certain venues. I saw it when I was at the O2, and it was an obstruction because what if someone who was disabled was trying to get past and they couldn’t because there were people that were sitting with tents and stuff. It ruins the experience for other people because these people just go to the extreme and camp outside to be front row whereas it shouldn't have to be like that it should just be general entry.”

Overall, while camping for concerts proves to be a controversial topic, one thing is for sure, even Scotland’s worst weather will not deter people from camping out to see their favourite artists up close.

Has camping for concerts gone too far?